Be Proactive

“How long will you neglect to go and possess the land?” Joshua 18:3 NKJV

When it comes to building good relationships, you must be proactive. This calls for knowing who you are as a person, and what you want from the relationship. While it seems counterintuitive to focus on who you are individually versus who the two of you are as a couple, the whole is only as strong as the parts. Great relationships are based on each party being truthful and up-front about their real needs, desires, feelings, and values. While as a couple you must make decisions together, decisions about who you are as a person and what you want your life to be are yours alone to make. Allowing someone else to make those decisions for you is a mistake.

When you let someone else decide who you are and what you want, you give away the power that God gave you. Understand this: (1) Doing nothing is not making a decision. (2) Sitting back and pretending not to see a situation for what it is, is not a decision. (3) Procrastinating until something happens where you’ve no choice but to go one way or the other is not a decision–it’s passivity–and in the end it won’t serve you well. Sometimes you have to accept unchangeable circumstances, but you can always choose how you want to act within them. This principle is taught clearly by what God told His people on the threshold of the Promised Land: “How long will you neglect to go in and possess the land which the Lord…has given you?” So, be proactive.